“I believe I owe you an apology, my lady.”

Her eyes flew up. His expression was suitably solemn, but his eyes twinkled. “It is I who must apologize …”

His smile made her lose her feet and she stumbled, he steadied her. “I should have called on you, but was recalled on business matters. Without your intervention things might have been far worse.”

Her gurgle of laughter attracted the attention of the other couples in the set. “Shall we agree to forget the incident, your grace?”

He nodded. “As you wish. May I say that I almost didn’t recognize you this evening?”

With wide eyes she replied. “And I you, your grace. Mud is an excellent disguise, is it not?”

This time his shout of mirth caused the unfortunate young lady to her left to step on her hem and tear the flounce clean off. The dagger look Isobel received almost made her lose her composure. He whirled her away in the promenade and she struggled with her giggles; he not assisting her efforts by winking down at her.

The remainder of the ball whirled past far quicker than she’d anticipated. In spite of her reservations she was not bored, in fact had never felt so invigorated in her life. She had danced with a variety of gentlemen both young and old, but none had been as charming or as handsome as Lord Bentley.

He had returned to claim her for the supper dance and by the end of the evening she had quite revised her former opinion and was halfway to liking him a great deal. She was not so I as to believe he was so afflicted and did not expect to hear from him again.

The next morning when she returned from her early morning ride she was greeted by a frantic Aunt Laura.”My dear girl, such an honour, indeed it is quite worth the aggravation of rising at the crack of dawn.”